2015’s Showcase script was based on the true story of Palisades, Nevada, a town which staged mock gunfights for the benefit of tourists brave enough to get off the train and wander around during its scheduled stops. Palisades earned a reputation as a lawless and dangerous yet exciting town to visit, but the whole town was in on the joke.

In reality it was a peaceful, average mining town and didn’t even have a sheriff.

For our fourth Showcase play we sang some Journey, made up a few skits, and undertook a treacherous journey into darkest Sherwood Forest, where Robin Hood had decided to leave his life of crime and turn to an equally lucrative but legitimate business. He and his band of merry men make sports equipment, including the finest Stick of Hockey in all the land – the Sher-Wood SlapStick!

This was our sixth production and we decided to open it at the Ryley Economic Development Committee awards dinner. We had great success with it, received a standing ovation and went on to do shows in Holden and finish up at the Bailey Theatre in Camrose.

This play by Fred Carmichael was the one we chose to do in the spring of 2013. It was a script with some really humorous moments, but it wasn’t a farce and had some interesting ghostly twists. For the first time, two of the students in the Junior Players program joined us on stage, Lucy Upham and Rebecca Hellekson.

By the time the first half of Showcase ended, we’d done the Time Warp again, played some games, showed off a few talents and had some fun. Next thing you know, intermission’s over and Jack’s waking up on the sofa to find that he’s in a really odd dream. This is how we spent our evenings on April 19 & 20, 2013. Click here to read the program, including our list of talented young actors.

This year we presented Jake’s adaptation of Peter Pan as well as a play by Martha Swintz called The King’s Creampuffs.

Class size had grown from our first year to 24 students from our initial baker’s dozen of 13, indicating the need and interest for a group such as this in the community. We had our Showcase in June and it was a huge success, but it conflicted with Holden’s annual Farmer’s Day and Soapbox Derby weekend and was a little too close to final exams for the students, so after this we decided to move Showcase to April where it’s been since then.

Tomatoes was our second play, which we did in the fall of 2011. We attracted some new actors and enjoyed ourselves tremendously!

Show dates ran from October 14 to 16. Even though the play only ran for three days, we did five shows; one on the Friday night, and two each on the Saturday and Sunday. You can read the program HERE.

Junior Players Showcase – 2011 [Program]

This was the culmination of our first year of drama. Thirteen students divided into two groups did some tableaus, improv, and then performed a Frankenstein adaptation by Jake Tkaczyk and Robert Fontaine’s Another Cinderella.

When we regrouped in 2010, we decided to pick up exactly where we left off – with Joseph Kesselring’s immortal Arsenic and Old Lace. In fact, we even used the very same set we used for the ’97 production, as though the years between had never happened. We ran this show from March 4 through 13, 2011. If you’d like to see the program, click HERE.

Upcoming Events

Classes run 4:15 til 6pm, and 6:15 til 8. Students are chosen in September, selected on a basis of aptitude, willingness and ability to work with others, and availability to regularly attend (class is not a drop-in).

Classes run 4:15 til 6pm, and 6:15 til 8. Students are chosen in September, selected on a basis of aptitude, willingness and ability to work with others, and availability to regularly attend (class is not a drop-in).

Based on the New York Times bestseller, WONDER tells the incredibly inspiring and heartwarming story of August Pullman, a boy with facial differences who enters fifth grade, attending a mainstream elementary school for the first time.